Rohingya relocation move involves serious risks

Seeing no headway in Rohingya repatriation even five months after signing a deal with Myanmar, the government has now made up its mind to relocate the refugees to new camps in Ukhia, Cox’s Bazar.

For shifting the Rohingya people from the makeshift camps, the government is building new shelters for them, cutting hills, felling trees and filling up low-lying areas.

Such activities were seen on Thursday during a visit to different areas of Ukhia, a major concentration of Rohingya refugees who fled Myanmar atrocities since October 2017.

However, the move to relocate the refugees, aimed at saving them from the risks of landslide, cyclone and excessive rainfalls at present camps, is rather creating further risks.

The government has allotted 540 acres of forest land for sheltering Rohingyas now living at the foot of hillocks.

So far, the forest department has allotted nearly 5,800 acres of land to accommodate the Myanmar nationals.

There were 20 camps in Ukhia, upazila nirbahi (executive) officer Md Nikaruzzaman told Prothom Alo. The number has increased to 30, all sprawling in areas between Kutupalang and Thaingkhali.

Authorities concerned have been asked to complete implementation of the government’s plans to tackle possible natural calamity that might affect the Rohingya camps.

UNSC team set to visit Bangladesh

A team of the United Nations’ Security Council will pay a visit to Bangladesh on Saturday to see conditions of the Rohingya refugees.

The UNSC team is also set to visit Myanmar on Monday.

Diplomats in Dhaka see the maiden visit of the UN team as a significant step in this regard.

Preparation for monsoon

Every Rohingya family in the camps is passing days in fear of storms and landslides.

Momena Khatun, who stays in Kutupalang D-4 camp, said, “We don’t know what would happen. We had to leave our homeland and now here we are about to face the monsoon. We could have been free of tensions, had the shelters been made stronger.”

The refugees, she said, are at risks as most of their shelters were built on the slopes of the hillocks.

Laila Khatun, a resident at the Ukhia’s Kutupalong refugee camp, said they had no previous experience of living on the hillocks. They are scared of landslide any time, she added.

As some Rohingya people were seen collecting firewood from nearby forest, and they told Prothom Alo that they were doing so for cooking foods.

Plants on nearly 500 acres of land have already disappeared, according to government officials who attributed this to lack of alternative sources of fuel for cooking at the camps.

As many as 100,000 Rohingyas are at high risks that may come from of hilly onrush and landslide, a government official said referring to a survey jointly conducted by the Asia Disaster Preparation Centre and Dhaka University.

The authorities had to cut hills to relocate at least 25,000 Rohingyas who were facing such risks, according to officials.

The initial government plan was to build 84,000 makeshift houses but the number had to be raised to 200,000.

''Initiative is being taken to relocate the Rohingyas shortly to safer camps,'' Cox’s Bazar’s refugee relief and rehabilitation commissioner Mohammad Abul Kalam told Prothom Alo. Some 20,000 Rohingyas have already been taken to safer camps, he pointed out.

Cox’s Bazar deputy commissioner Md Kamal Hossain also expressed the same sentiment as he said the monsoon might cause flooding, landslide, cyclone and even tidal surge.

So, he said, Refugee, Relief, and Rehabilitation Commission (RRRC), International Organisation for Migration (IMO), and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) have been working jointly to relocate the Rohingyas.

The shelters that are risky have already been identified.

However, BRAC University’s professor emeritus Ainun Nishat said the trees were just looted in the name of security and the nature has been damaged permanently.

“The Rohingyas should have been given shelter on Teknaf embankment and its adjacent plain land,” he expressed his views.

The stay of the Rohingyas in Bangladesh is being prolonged as the repatriation deal between Bangladesh and Myanmar reached in December 2017 has so far failed to send a single refugee back to Myanmar.

More than 700,000 Rohingya came to Bangladesh to escape persecution by the Myanmar authorities in northern Rakhine state since 25 August 2017.